Fuck, making this short and sweet is hard. Background: got married way too young (to a man) and had kids. He was shitty and I was gay so we separated and dated other people. I fell hard for the woman I was dating but husband's relationship went sour and he came back and persuaded me we could keep the family together after all. I got suckered in and (amicably) broke up with my girlfriend. Months later I reached out to her and informed her that I recognize my actions were very stupid, she and I became friends again, and I ended things with the husband again and am in the divorce process.

It's been over a year since exgf and I broke up. I am still smitten but it feels like it would be wrong to bring up my feelings, like I had my chance and I messed it up so now I have no business dumping my damned feelings on her. It feels more ethical to just silently have a crush and simply enjoy having her friendship instead. That's my perspective, but my friends are skeptical, so I'm here to ask y'all: does this make sense to you too or am I being unreasonably hard on myself?